Morley Torgov - A Good Place to Come from

A Good Place to Come From

Morley Torgov

Published by Bev Editions

ISBN: 978-0-9878146-2-3

Copyright 1974 Morley Torgov

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

To himin lieu of candles

Contents

For their constant encouragement and support during the writing of this book, I am deeply indebted to my wife Anna Pearl, my children Sarah Jane and Alexander, and my friends Beverley Slopen, Lois and Jack Shayne, Lila and Alex Mogelon, Helen Mathe, Sydney M. Harris and Ben Kayfetz.

M.T.

It was four o'clock in the afternoon, a half hour before train time. "We better get going," my father said, snapping shut the locks on his brown valise. The businesslike tone of his voice, the sharp clicking of the locks, the firmness of his step as we walked toward the careverything contributed to an air of determination. "It's only a two-minute drive to the station, what's the rush?" I asked. "Sure, that's right," he responded, "leave everything to the last minute, drive like a crazy fool, kill somebody, ruin a perfectly good brand new car, what do you care?" I shook my head in defeat. It was no use trying to convince him I cared.

Always, on the day my father was leaving for Toronto to buy goods for his store, there was this atmosphere of tension, this feeling of great commercial urgency: schedules to be met, judgments to be exercised (will this be a hot little item? ... will this be a lemon?), deals to be made, money to be spentall this to be accomplished in the garmentmanufacturing jungle that was Spadina Avenue in those days. This time, however, my father was especially on edge. Earlier that day he had taken delivery of a new 1949 Pontiac sedanhis first new car since before the war. It was gleaming black with white sidewall tires; parallel chrome stripes ran along the centre of the hood and continued again over the trunk lid giving the car a sleek, sporty appearance. "Look how she sits, just like the Queen Mary," my father said as he rolled the car lovingly, almost tenderly, out of the dealer's garage on Tancred Street. We made our way home along Queen Street behind the proud prominent nose of the chrome Indian head mounted atop the grille. My father's touch at the wheel was delicate, as if he were driving a crystal chandelier. Suddenly, at the corner of Queen and Bruce, mere yards away from where his own garage waited with doors thrust open to receive the distinguished new guest, rain began to fall, a soft mid-May rain. "Ach, sonofabitch!" he hissed, switching on the wipers. "Rain! My goddam luck. There must be a devil in my life. That's all there is to it ... a devil in my life."

That had been several hours ago. Now we were on our way to the C.P.R. station at the head of Pilgrim Street. It was my maiden voyage at the helm (he had handed me the key to the ignition as if it was the key to a great city) and I drove as the historic importance of the moment dictated avoiding pot-holes and puddles, creeping warily through intersections, while my father sat nodding with approval. He smelt strongly of after-shave lotion, having shavedas he always did when he was leaving for Torontoonly an hour before train time. "Got to look my best," he would explain, "just in case I run into a good-looking squaw between here and Sudbury." That pre-train shave was the only festive gesture in an otherwise solemn departure routine.

I drove, and we talked... or rather he talked.

"You'll remember to double-check the cash at the end of each day to make sure it's not short or over. What's the combination to the safe?"

"Left to forty, right to twenty-two, left again to fifteen, then right again to fifty."

"Good. Try not to forget it."

"Okay. I'll write the numbers down on a piece of paper"

"Schmeckle! Somebody'll find it"

"So what should I do for godsake?"

"Keep repeating it. Say it over to yourself a few times every day."

"I got a great idea," I said. "Maybe I'll say it before meals, like grace."

"That's right, smart-alec, make fun. You'll see how funny it is some day when you come into the store and find the whole goddam place cleaned out... everything gone, stolen!"

I rattled off the magic numbers once again just to make him happy. He went on. "Remember to turn off the window lights at ten each night, don't waste electricity. You'll roll up the awning if it looks like rain but for Chrisake remember to put it down if it's sunny, it shouldn't fade the goods in the windows. And make sure you lock the garage good and tight before you go to bed. You never can tell these days who'll fool around with the car, there's so many strangers in town now. Oh yes, and stay off Wellington Street; they're putting down fresh tar on the road, the bastards, and it makes a mess of the tires. "

"A person would think you're going to Europe," I said.

He sighed deeply. "Europe. I only wish to hell I was going to Europe. Anywhere but Toronto. Those whores on Spadina, I can see them now, dragging out one lousy shmateh after another, telling every lie in the book about how wonderful their crap is put together and how much they're selling to this one and to that one. Making phony promises. Gypsies, every one of 'em."

"So why do you stay in the ladies-wear business?" I asked.

"Why do I stay? Because there's a devil in my life. That's all there is to it."

As he said this, the car bounced into and out of a giant pot-hole. I grinned sheepishly. "Sorry."

"Why the hell don't you look where you're going?" he pleaded, wounded and bleeding there on the passenger side.

"I did look, honest to God"

"If you looked, how ... how could you possibly drive right into it?"

"I don't know. I guess there's a devil in my life, and that's all there is to it."

Staring straight ahead through the windshield, maintaining a sharp lookout for pot-holes, he sighed deeply again. "You see," he said quietly, "a university can give you an educationbut it can't give you brains."

Rain began to fall again, pelting down into the face of the chrome Indian, drumming like war music against the black hood. We were almost at the intersection of Queen and Pilgrim, about to turn north to the station. "Look at this lousy town," he said moodily, "six months winter, six months rain. Sault Shtunk Marie. Same weather. Same side walks. Same buildings. Same faces day in, day out."

"You're just sore because it's raining on your car," I said, trying to sound cheerful. "Just think of this: if you'd stayed in Russia you wouldn't be driving a new Pontiac now, you'd be a slave to some dumb Siberian Cossack."

"What's the difference whose ass you kiss? In Russia it was a Cossack's, here it's some bitch-of-a-customer's ass. I dug a grave for myself in this town, that's all there is to it." "So be happy," I suggested. "You're off to Toronto. A few days out of the grave."

"Every place is a grave. Russia was a grave. The Soo's a grave. Toronto's a grave. You see this car? It's a toy, that's all. It's a toy they give you to play with, to take your mind off all the crap you had to put up with to earn the toy. It means nothing. Jesus Christ! Be careful. "

I swung the car hard just in time to miss another giant pot-hole. "The sonsofbitches," my father said, referring to the local Works Department, "they got no respect for other people's property."

We stood on the platform waiting for the conductor's signal to board. "Every time I come here," my father said, "I think of the first time you went to Camp Borden with the Air Cadetswhen was that, 1943?and you told me on the way to the station I shouldn't kiss you goodbye in front of the other boys. When I drove away afterwards, I was so upset I wasn't sure should I laugh or cry. Now look at you. College boy. Big shit!"